Saturday, November 10, 2007

What is a Church Lady?

Church Ladies can be found anywhere a priest, seminarian, or acolyte finds themselves in need of a little Feminine Genius, particularly in practical matters (and often before they realize the need).

Whatever vocation she has discerned, much of her spare time will be devoted to Catholic activities. This could include Eucharistic Adoration, sewing buttons back on a cassock, or throwing back a few particularly Catholic beverages with friends. (Said beverages were likely received in return for the aforementioned buttons.)

She is the antithesis of both the Planned Parenthood and Womenpriests mentalities. Whether she has no physical children or a vanful, her vocation as a mother is played out in thousands of little acts of service to her spiritual children.

Her talents may range from laundry to gardening to unjamming copiers, but she always seeks to use them ad majorem Dei gloriam.

Well, count me in! Now the priests at the parish now do not care for church ladies, but in the past, I have mended and hemmed and been involved in many aspects of parish life.

A few weeks ago father said that church ladies are like the pharisee that thinks himself righteous. Imagine, they sometimes have the gall to point out a liturgical abuse or ask why something is done! The ones that might weat a mantilla are really the ones to watch for (and they are probably even hoping for a latin mass)

Not a lady myself, but three cheers for the church ladies! You are the angels who keep the sanctuary not merely "clean" but beautiful, worthy of our God. You are the angels who remind us men to mind our manners, to shine our shoes, to care for our own appearance as we shall always and everywhere (but especially in divine worship) appear before our God. You are the women who seek not to get in the way but to help along the way.

And without you we would have sorrow greater than Adam's. Thank God for church ladies!

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"Necessary emphasis should be placed on the 'genius of women,' not only by considering great and famous women of the past or present, but also those ordinary women who reveal the gift of their womanhood by placing themselves at the service of others in their everyday lives. For in giving themselves to others each day women fulfill their deepest vocation." --LETTER OF POPE JOHN PAUL II TO WOMEN, 29 June 1995